


|eye of mythosaur|

by littlekaracan



Category: The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Cara Dune is a good bro, Gen, british spellings of names, gonna whump din djarin so good, im sorry, my hopeless attempts at figuring out footnotes, shes also the equivalent of... like... a high priestess cuz i got that vibe, the armorer is din's honorary mom, the armorer pov, the forge is her altar byee
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-22
Updated: 2020-03-08
Packaged: 2021-02-28 05:46:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 18,582
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22838803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littlekaracan/pseuds/littlekaracan
Summary: Dozens of capable Mandalorian warriors massacred.  The walls dyed red, the countless bodies strewn about. By all means, it's a bloodbath.The Armourer survives.
Comments: 27
Kudos: 125





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> right let's do the warnings before everythin else:  
> -there's gonna be a lot of death. a Lot of it  
> -that includes some dead kids  
> -as the content warned, graphic descriptions of wounds and stuff.  
> look out and take care!

Din Djarin was there for the aftermath, after the stench had evaporated, the dust had settled and the smoke had cleared. When the Covert no longer reeked of blood and sweat and waste. Din Djarin saw a pile of neatly stacked chestplates, and helmets, and he saw in the armour those that used to be. Din Djarin was most definitely overwhelmed by the freezing dread in his gut when he saw the faces of his dead kind, she could hear it in the way his voice trembled, in the way he was quick to blame, but Din Djarin was not there for the massacre. Not this one.

Men, women, neither, children. She could hardly tell who was who in the chaos. All she knew, all that all of them knew was that as long as they still held their weapons in their hands, there was hope. 

_Our strength was once in our numbers_ , Paz Vizla had said. 

_Our survival is our strength,_ the Armourer had answered. It was true. It had been true.

Their numbers had not been significant for the past years at all. And now, everywhere the Armourer turned, they were rapidly lessening. And their survival, hers included, was suddenly not so much of a certainty anymore.

The stormtroopers were everywhere, the sickening white glittering in the dim light, and it was a feast for them. It was a feast for them, as they'd get to kill so many, the dastardly savages, and the Mandalorians had no means of defense.

At least the stormtroopers believed that.

Cornered Mandalorians - men, women, neither, children - were not the type to surrender. They were not the type to negotiate. They were the type to survive, and if not - to die the deaths of warriors. Not ones to scream, or cry, or beg. It went against their very core. The stormtroopers received a nasty surprise. 

But, in the end, there were simply too many of them. Swarming the halls, laserfire drowning out the shrieks of pain and the wails of younglings. A Mandalorian could take half a dozen of such enemies if given an advantage, and a couple less than that if not, but they came in tens. It felt like hundreds. They descended upon their Enclave, wreaking havoc, leaving blood and mangled bodies in their wake.

The Armourer rallied her people, shouting and hitting her weapons against one another. She rarely ever raised her voice. She didn't need to. Until now, they had listened.

Now, they could not hear her.

"Fight," she asked of them.

There were so many. There were too many.

"Do not surrender your weapons," she asked of them.

She could hear the clashing of Beskar around her, all around her, people falling and kneeling and dying. They were losing. They were losing in the most horrid way.

"Do not let them take away your honour," she asked of them.

They listened. They did not cower. They did not die in vain. They died fighting, protecting, believing.

She cried out, and kept on going.

She tripped the closest stormtrooper flat on its rear and brought her hammer down, shattering the skull. It hadn't yet dropped to the floor before the Armourer was onto another, grabbing it and slinging an arm over its chest, and then breaking its neck.

A cry caught her attention.

Amidst the mass of bodies, a foundling was just out of reach, frozen in place, though holding the knife up in a firm grip - over his caretaker's body. She had fallen with her arms stretched out in a last attempt to save her family. Her weapons had been rendered useless, and now the child stood still in front of the soldiers that had cornered him. There was no escape - but he was prepared to fight and die for the Creed, it seemed, despite still knowing the freezing clutches of overwhelming fear.

One reached out. Hooked a hand under his helmet. The child choked a gasp and wrapped his arms around it, dropping the knife in order to keep the helm on.

The Armourer leapt and swung her hammer in half a circle, effortlessly shattering the helmet of the offending stormtrooper. By the time the rest turned their attention to her, she had broken one soldier's jaw and cut through another's armour to bury steel deep in the flesh, as scorching as her fury.

There were many stormtroopers, and only one Armourer, but if they thought they were going to walk out of here with her helmet off her head, they were going to be very disappointed. She made sure of it. Stormtroopers with snapped necks. Stormtroopers with broken bones. Bodies piled up around her.

There was no end to the bloodshed. Even after she had disposed of the ones that had gathered around the child, more kept coming. The Armourer pulled the foundling behind her, shielding him with her body until he could find a weapon, and fought her way out.

The Mandalorians were overwhelmed, overtaken, overrun, and she was beginning to see with her own eyes how much saving one of their own had cost them. She had watched the red veil set over her for the past few days, sensing a terrible calamity, but one's mind could never rid itself of the fog of imagination. One's intuition, even a deep-reaching one she'd always possessed, could never prepare them for reality. Bodies and blood and weapons and helmets - her eyes drifted across faces she'd never seen before and had never hoped to see, she saw faces that she could put a voice to and be correct but _why would she want to_ , when everything was taken from them, when their last shreds of dignity were ripped away along with their helmets, falling to the ground along with their lifeless bodies?

The Armourer would put the helmets back on the bodies, if she was to live through this. It was her duty. But if she, too, was going to die, she was not going to make it easy. She was going to die following her Creed, her _Resol'nare_ , she was going to drag every single one of them down with her.

Her weapons were made to forge armour for her people. Her weapons knew little of such pointless bloodshed, little of defense. It knew far more of fair fights, or unfair fights in her favour instead of a one-way massacre, trying to preserve as much of her as possible. And only in her hands could they sing, whistle, spinning and bashing and never betraying; a Mandalorian's weapons would never betray them. Not in a thousand years. Not ever.

Not unless their wielder would be delivered a trick shot to the back, knocking them forward, then be briefly grabbed and lifted, and finally slammed into the wall behind them. The helmet protected her head, but the pressure on her neck failed to subside - soon, the Armourer found that she was not standing on the ground; she could not reach it. Warmth was squeezing through her side and dripping to the ground - she had been shot. Hit by a ricochet, if she had to take a guess. The stormtrooper had thrown her head back and had a large hand had wrapped around her throat, its blaster destroyed by her hand. Her hammer.

The Armourer still held it in her grip. She didn’t see how many others were left, or what was going on, exactly - her vision was blurring, breath stuck in her throat, unable to squeeze through to her lungs.

She managed to muster up just enough strength to raise the hammer overhead. Cold gloved fingers were on her chin, and her helmet was being lifted.

Her visor was halfway up her forehead, then for what reason was she seeing red? Breathing red, hearing nothing but the sizzling anger underneath. This creature had no right to take away from her what she had dutifully protected since she could so much as lift her helmet. It had no right to defile her this way. The cold handle of her weapon was a comfort. A shield.

She dropped it.

If the Armourer had brought her hammer down with such force when she was forging a plate, even Beskar would've had split in two. The bone cracked and shattered beneath her, blood sprayed, the helmet useless against a Mandalorian smith's tools.

She was released, but when her feet hit the ground, her legs failed her; she had not yet taken a breath, and a sharp pain shot up her body as she fell to her knees. Colours were dancing in her eyes, blurring her vision, and she wondered for a moment if her helmet had been ruined. No, she trusted her craft far too much - that could only mean, however, that _she_ had been ruined instead. Dragging in a long breath through her teeth, she reached out and tripped one of the passing stormtroopers with the handle of her hammer in her last attempt to fight the darkness that was creeping in from the corners of her eyes.

The falling stormtrooper knocked her helmet down with the base of his blaster, the sound of Beskar against bone enveloped the world, and the darkness closed in.

The Armourer collapsed, dreaming already of where she would awaken, and how many she would see. She would stand anew and march, far far away. Forever along with those that had chosen the Way. She looked forward to it. 

Never had the Armourer truly feared death, and she had taught her own not to as well. Her only hope was that her teachings helped them in one way or another.

The footsteps she was hearing were almost rhythmic, almost home. She swore she could make out singing, talking, in a language she was raised to speak, born to speak, born to teach and born to keep. She could feel Beskar against her body, and it was so easy to give herself up to her nature. To become part of Manda, to truly become whole. 

But the small nagging feeling somewhere deep in her gut couldn't let her go. Perhaps instead it couldn’t allow _her_ to let herself go. She sank into thought in the comfortable darkness, in this little place between worlds she could stay in forever, if she wanted to. But she held duties. 

Who would find her body, she wondered. Who would find all of them? Would any of them have survived? She prayed it to be the little ones. The younglings were the future. And yet she knew, deep down, that she could find no comfort in meaningless hopes. The stormtroopers didn’t care about age or importance. They killed. And they killed. Without reason. The Armourer couldn’t let her own be forgotten by the living. She was the Alor to the Tribe 1 \- who would forge for the survivors, if there were any? Who would help them start anew? Those were her duties.

She wished to become part of Manda, desired it since the moment she could utter the word, and she had waited so long. She had seen so many melt into it, fulfill their own identical desire. But she had treasured the Way more than anything else in her life. And protecting those that may have gotten through all this laserfire, all this bloodspill was the Way. Her Tribe, living on, the armour, the forge, the people. Those were her duties. Those were her duties, and she was not about to give them up.

After this, the dream did not last long. From the dark, the Armourer looked into the fiery eyes of the Mythosaur, staring her down from atop her very forge, and awoke.

She hurt. She hurt, but it did not matter. The helmet was still on her head. This was good. Little else mattered, because this meant she was not disgraced. Even if her helmet had been removed while she was unconscious and she was unaware of this, therefore not ruling it a violation of the Creed, she still would’ve tracked down each and every stormtrooper that had seen her face and put them down.

The Armourer raised her hands, and pressed the palms to the sides of the helmet. It would stay on for a long time.

She sat up, hurting as quietly as she could, then worked her way up until she was standing. The warmth - her blood - wasn’t flowing anymore, rather trickling down her hip, her thigh in a slow stream, and so she could afford to ignore it for as long as she could stand. One of her hands was on the wall, but she had picked up her hammer in the other. It had been resting clutched in her fist as soon as she woke up.

The Armourer turned to look over the Enclave, and all her thoughts set back. Absolute silence descended onto her mind, and the feeling that seeped into her bones she could recognize only as true dread.

She had lived. The rest of her kind had not received such a mercy.

The realization left her cold, in a way. There was no one else in the corridors. Nobody but her and the bodies, carelessly strewn about. She could not blame them. Staying in the darkness, they’d see their children, their parents, their siblings and their friends, their loved ones, the ones they died for and the ones that died for them. They’d march forever alongside their families, one in Manda, with the Way in their hearts that didn’t beat anymore. They chose to abandon life and continue through the darkness, leaving her behind, alone with her own choice.

Not the most courageous path, she admitted, but it was part of the Way. Part of Resol’nare. They had all been tired. She herself had been tired, although she’d never confess it. Such was the Way.

 _Like sand rats_. 

A gruff noise behind her caught her ear, and she whipped around. This last stormtrooper in the halls had fallen - it was kneeling, clutching the injured side of its hip. It looked to be in a great deal of pain. Groaning silently, it was trying to wrap the wound, but its fate was quite obvious already - especially considering a dead Mandalorian had just stood up.

The Armourer had been so overwhelmed by the sense of determination, the clean, even, persistent fire always sparked in a fight, she’d forgotten to be angry. 

She remembered, now. She remembered very well.

Taking small but not unimposing steps toward him, she let her glance sweep the floor, taking in the sights of each body. Once she stood in front of the stormtrooper, towering over it, her face twisted into an expression of disgust - although it would not see it.

“You-- you were dead,” it managed, but the Armourer barely even heard it, and definitely did not care for what it had to say.

"You spared not a single little one," she said, and her voice was deceptively even, loyally keeping her fury contained for now. “You killed even the most harmless of younglings.”

The stormtrooper said something. Now she really wasn’t listening.

“You have deprived my Tribe of its future,” she said, and her voice quivered, but she forced it down before it could melt through. “You have stolen its present, and you attempted to erase its past.”

“I’ll shoot,” the stormtrooper said, threatening her, assuming that anyone, even a Mandalorian, who was as wounded as her wouldn’t have the strength to fight back if shot.

She kicked the blaster out of its hand, and pressed down its arm with her heel. The stormtrooper grunted in pain, and she continued.

“You are soulless,” she told it, staring right at its face. “As ruthless than the people that gave you orders. Following them defines you. You are cowards. You are devoid of any sort of virtue. Mindless, murderers, _demagolka_.”2

She raised her hammer above her head one last time. It shrieked, but her foot was still on its arm, holding it firmly in place.

“And you will die as such.”

Without even glancing down properly again, the Armourer slammed her hammer down on its head, and it collapsed right where it knelt.

She stepped over the body, and her hammer fell against her belt with a quiet click. There were many dead. It was going to be a lot of work, she thought, to gather all the Beskar.

For probably the first time in her life, the pragmatism that came so naturally to her was followed by a twinge of disgust. At herself. But there was no helping it. No Mandalorian could leave everything like this. It was the Way.

Slowly, the bodies of the stormtroopers were dragged out, dumped across the corridors in random patterns as to not lead the way to her for as long as possible. After she'd placed all of them where nobody would see them unless they were actively looking, she returned to the Enclave.

It was time for her Tribe.

The Armourer walked across the walls, brushing her fingers alongside the surface, chipped and blackened and burnt. She could hardly stand to look at so many in the middle of the room. So many she'd known. One thing was certain - as many as there were, there were still too few to be all of them. Some of them must've escaped - some of them must be alive. 

But she was afraid - she, _afraid_ \- of recognizing the ones that were not. She knew there was nothing to fear in death, and yet.

She shook her head and let go.

Slowly, the Armourer made her way around the Covert, picking up as many helmets as she could carry - so many had been knocked down, or ripped off in glee after the kill. She cradled them close and dear, and, once all was collected, began reuniting the Mandalorians with their helmets. Even after death, they would wear one, until the last moments before they were burnt or buried. Until there was not a soul that will see them without it.

The process was quite simple: pick a helmet, then find the matching armour or the person she’d known to wear the type. Gently slide the helmet back onto them, and lay them down near the wall, in the line of bodies, waiting for their turns. The impact of the process was foul. Made her feel all kinds of sick.

With each helmet she spotted, her face would fall underneath hers. With each body she recognized, her vision would blur. She was on the worst manhunt one could imagine. Unwanted memories were flooding her and drowning her; the armour she’d made, the signets she’d revealed, the future she’d promised.

All lost to the fire.

They had been defiled, desecrated, their bodies, if the Armourer had died this day, would've rotten with the maggots and the rats. They had awakened, now, in a different place, to which she could not follow. They had all been her children.

She picked up a cyan-tinted helmet and brushed off the dust, looking around for its owner. It was well-kept, hardly a scratch on it. It must’ve been practically shining until then. That was how she found its wearer.

The Armourer came to kneel by the side of a woman she knew mostly by sight rather than voice. She tended to remember. Dutifully, she turned her gaze away from the woman’s face, instead focusing on her armour. It had been extraordinarily clean, just before all hell broke loose. The woman was young, and took care of her pride like one would of their own child.

"Inik Sel," the Armourer muttered, reaching out to raise the woman’s head - when movement caught her eye. Inik’s eyelids fluttered

The Armourer nearly let her go from sheer surprise. She leaned closer, raising Inik's head to study her face, only a little lost and a lot less hopeful. 

Inik’s eyes were half-open, drooping, hazy and unfocused. The Armourer looked down, and realized almost immediately that there was nothing to be done; no wonder she’d assumed without checking for vital signs. One entire side of her body was completely mangled, there was hardly any blood squeezing through the armour anymore, and it took Inik a minute or so to recognize the Armourer.

Then, with a look of wild horror on her face, Inik seemed to realize her helmet wasn’t on her head, and attempted to squirm away from the Armourer’s grip on the back of her neck. She made an effort to reach for her face, cover it, but her remaining hand would not rise past her waist, dropping on her stomach and twitching helplessly. 

“Don’t,” she managed, and a few droplets of blood trickled down her lips. Black blood. Blood from deep within. She was gone. “ _Don’t…_ Ah…”

Her head fell to the side that was unsupported by the Armourer’s hand. Her gaze froze on the mess that was left from her body, and she closed her eyes, choking back a sob. There was no chance she didn’t know what was going to happen to her.

Courage was always in order, but the Armourer was not senseless. There was only so much calm to keep once you’ve seen your own life slowly dripping to the ground. The Armourer would not scold a dying woman for such a reaction.

Instead, she carefully placed the helmet down on the ground, and brought her remaining hand to Inik’s face as well. As gentle as her touch could be through the thick gloves, she made an uncommon effort to be cautious, turning Inik’s head back so she was looking straight up, away from the puddle of blood she was in. Her eyes were still closed, involuntary tears of great pain, no doubt, streaming down her face, as she tried to get away, get all eyes away from her face.

“You were defiled,” the Armourer told her, holding her in place, but deliberately not looking at her until she did so first. “Your helmet was removed when you were unresponsive. Unconscious. You were defiled. But this did not strip you of your status and of your identity.”

Inik’s eyes slowly fluttered open once more. This time, the Armourer doubted whether she saw anything at all, other than coloured shapes glimmering in the dim light of the Enclave. The Armourer had only stated the truth, but there was still a choice for Inik to make - whether she would die loyal to her Covert, or refuse the creed that took her life.

“You fought well,” the Armourer said, quietly. Inik had taken down more than a few stormtroopers, despite her civility of character. Inik had been a Mandalorian. 

The Armourer was still and silent for a little while, pretending not to feel the lump in her throat at the dryness of the air, the stench of blood. 

“...Be proud,” she concluded. “Manda awaits you. It is a good death.”

Slowly, very slowly, Inik raised her hands. They were still twitching, aimless, uncoordinated, but they reached for the Armourer, and for the helmet that she’d placed on the ground. The Armourer watched in wait, letting go of Inik’s neck with one hand. 

“Please,” Inik said. Pleaded. The Armourer realized she didn’t recognize her - for all she knew, she was talking to a stormtrooper, and yet - still she asked for-- “My… My-- My helmet.” Her fingers tugged on the edge of the Armourer’s glove, and then fell. “Please...” 

The Armourer nodded - not that Inik could see. She took it off the ground, raised Inik a little more, and gently placed the helmet over her head. Instantly, a breathy and faint sigh of relief escaped from underneath.

“Thank you,” came a muffled whisper.

And, in a few moments, Inik was dead.

The Armourer bowed her head.

 _Ni su'cuyi, gar kyr'adyc, ni partayli, gar darasuum_.3

It took a while to realize she was speaking out loud. It took a little longer to understand that she’d said it twice, thrice, five times, ten times.

Eternal. Eternal. She remembered. They were all eternal. Not gone, but marching. Far away, far away.

The Armourer slid her arms underneath Inik's back and knees and picked her up, to bring her to the others and to continue her work.

The last helmet was - and the Armourer’s breath was whisked away without her even noticing - the last helmet was tiny. If she’d placed her gloved hand inside, it would’ve probably gotten stuck. The Armourer recognized the helmet of the youngling she’d been so eager to protect earlier on. He lay motionless and quiet, a look of panic frozen in his eyes. His head was on the chest of his mother, her hand over his shoulders, as if they were stubborn enough to hold onto each other, even in death.

_Death is life. One should die as they have lived._

They kicked a helmet off a foundling. Off a child. They killed him, and they thought it wasn't enough, so they defiled his corpse. _And we are the savages, we are the desecrators of life? We are the cultists, the punishers, the ruthless, the Enemy, the Danger, when the Empire, with no hesitation, strips a defenseless, no, dead child of the last barrier between him and the threat that claimed him?_

Her vision tinged with red again. This would all become unbearable, soon. Soon, but not yet.

The Armourer slid the helmet on. 

All of them in a line, and it was over. As the fires roared and rose behind the Armourer, she merely closed her eyes and attempted to level her breathing. The crackle of the fire, her sound of comfort, of safety, was now coated in bittersweet shade. 

After all had been done, she was the one that stacked the armour into a neat pile. There seemed to be considerably less than there were people, and she took solace at least in that. But what a terrible sight the discarded armour was, nonetheless. She counted at least four of the same tiny helmets she’d seen before, plates that mirrored her own, she recognized her craft, her care and effort and quiet pleasure over how this or that piece turned out.

Slowly, overtaken by so many things she couldn’t pinpoint the origin of, the Armourer lifted her hands and pressed her palms to the sides of her helmet. The cooling metal was the sole comfort.

Her fingers hooked onto the protrusions, and lifted the helmet off her head.

She didn’t remember what it felt like for her hair not to touch the back of her neck, but she didn’t pay much attention to it. All was far brighter without the helmet, but she didn’t pay much attention to it. The helmet was far heavier in her hands than it had been on her head. She didn’t pay much attention to it.

No, not quite. She stepped forward and placed her helmet down by the pile of armour, feeling awfully stiff.

Then, the Armourer sank to the floor, to her knees, hands in front of her, folded double, reaching for something far in the distance. For the stars, one might say, if all of them hadn’t fallen already, if all of them hadn’t burnt out and shattered right in front of her. One might’ve thought she was praying - granted, to gods she didn’t believe in. 

The Armourer, for one of the few times in her life, wasn’t sure of what she was going to do. No, well, she knew what she was going to do now - gather, melt, gather, forge, melt, forge, run - but afterwards? So many dead. So many, so well-known to her. All within Manda, now. 

She took a deep breath, eyes pressed tightly shut. The ground was cold and unwelcoming, but heat poured off her forge in waves. She didn’t need to know everything that was going to happen, she reasoned. The Armourer knew their past, her past, and there was only so far one could get without it. She was better than that. Wallowing in loss was a much needed state to be in every once in a while, but definitely not for long, and not if you’re the Armourer.

The Tribe would find her. She would find them, in turn. The Tribe needed their Armourer, after all. And she’d be there. With open arms.

She stood up, put her helmet back on, and her hands stopped trembling. The room dimmed under the shade of the visor, bringing some comfort with it. She had no more time to lose. The Empire was no more - but its remnants, it seemed, were just as keen on hunting Mandalorians as ever.

The first one to come back to her was, a little ironically, Din Djarin, and rather soon, too. She did not count the days - only the pieces she’d salvaged, the weight of the Beskar she’d saved when she couldn’t save its wearers.

But his swift return did not mean her aforementioned arms weren’t open or that he wasn’t allowed in his own home. They knew what the price of protecting family could be, all of them. The Armourer had never been one to blame people for things that weren’t their fault, especially when it was this clear that they were hurting so.

And Din Djarin wasn’t in his best shape when he got to her. She caught notice of a limp, but it disappeared once he started talking to her - medicine, she concluded. How badly had he been hurt? 

There was no point in pondering things that were no more, she decided.

He had brought three along with him; two humans, one droid. It startled the Armourer the slightest bit at first, seeing outsiders. She assumed the foreign voices to be the stormtroopers, returned - her hand involuntarily dropped down to her hammer, and her thoughts raced; she would reach them, and she’d kill them, but she’d have to be quick about it - if she slipped up, one of them could easily gun her down - or alert more, and the Beskar would never be salvaged, or worse - return to the forsaken Imperial forges.

But then, Din Djarin spoke - in a loud voice, angry voice, an accusation. The desperate desire to blame, fault, so one doesn’t fault themselves, but there was nobody to blame. Or at least nobody within reach.

The Armourer couldn’t discern what emotion Din Djarin’s silence entailed upon hearing her interruption and seeing her alive and well, other than a few aching scratches he couldn’t see and the now-useless bacta patch that she’d pressed to her side underneath the armour, but she didn’t much care. He followed her with questions as she filled the cart with what remaining armour it could carry, and she led them back to her forge. Loading the metal inside, she was glancing at the others from the corner of her eye; they were Din Djarin’s friends, perhaps, but there were two factors that didn’t bring her much comfort. First, the armourer of a tribe would inevitably develop a sense of possessiveness and pride toward their forge, like a priest with a sacred altar, and there wasn’t much they could do to remedy it.

Second, Din Djarin did not have the greatest track record with choosing friends, exactly. He did well disposing of people who had betrayed him, but his little problem was that he’d _let_ them betray him first, always give them the benefit of the doubt. Most warriors were paranoid, and Din Djarin was no exception - but a healthy dose of Mandalorian paranoia would usually save one from the initial betrayal, not help them claw their way out of the aftermath alive. 

The two humans stood by the sides of the hallway, looking up at her as she melted down the plates, and from the way they were staring, she was certainly distrusted as well. But it seemed that Din Djarin served well as the middle ground, and as long as they didn’t step out of line, she was willing to be civil - and vice versa. Although she still did not like their presence in the Covert for the Mandalorians, she opted to simply ignore them for the most part.

Except this wasn’t the Covert. Not anymore. Not with only two of them, while the other survivors were somewhere out there.

After she was done with this, The Armourer would find them. Guide them back. Build another safehouse. Rally her kind again and ensure their safety as best as she could.

For now, however, she had a possible signet, a jetpack, and some curiosity.

“Show me the one whose safety deemed all this destruction,” she asked of Din Djarin, turning away from the forge as to let the metal dissolve fully into the fire.

After being directed to the droid, she raised her eyebrows. The Child was tiny. Defenseless.

“This is the one,” she said, looking into the mischievous, sweet big eyes, “that you hunted, then saved?” 

The child cooed once and went silent when she didn’t show any signs of being fazed by it. Din Djarin confirmed her words, and she remembered the shame his entire being exuded when he told her of how he'd been helped in fending off a mudhorn by an enemy. She watched him closely and, upon failing to hear the same shame in his voice, felt a little surge of, _something_ , in her chest.

Obviously quite attached to Din Djarin, the child burrowed deeper in the sack, eyeing him instead of the Armourer. Turning her head, she saw Din Djarin hesitate, but ultimately let her examine it further. Instead, she drew back and returned to her forge to fish out a scoop of metal.

The Armourer had made her decision.

“It is a Foundling,” she said, and physically saw in her head Din Djarin’s mouth open, then close. 

Of course it was a foundling - how could it be not? It cared so clearly about Din Djarin, enough to lift a beast into the air to save him, enough to possibly die itself. And Din Djarin had all but claimed it as his child already, it seemed. The way he kept glancing back at the sack it was in, not even attempting to be subtle; how taken aback he was when the Armourer suggested the Child was born of the enemy, bordering on fearful.

The Armourer had seen many foundlings, and many caretakers - Din Djarin had once been the former, and now he was going to be the latter.

A mudhorn skull came to life underneath her hands; her tools whispering in glee at one more asset for one more Mandalorian, delighted to serve their true purpose. The Armourer didn’t need weapons to kill as long as she had her tools, but the goal was using them to create weaponry, re-establish and upkeep their culture. It came like second nature to her, it had always been that way. The Way.

She attached the signet to Din Djarin’s shoulder as he watched her work, stilling. 

“You are a clan of two,” the Armourer said, and, for the first time that day, she felt like a little of the warmth of her forge lived inside her, too. A little bit of the Tribe, still there. 

But, she deduced, listening to the footsteps and the blasterfire, if Din Djarin, his child and the rest didn’t leave very soon, they’d all be ambushed. He insisted she go with them a second time - she refused again, reminding him there was still work to be done, and there was nobody left but her that would commit to it under the threat of death.

The Armourer glanced at the woman, one of his friends. She seemed to understand the danger, gaze deep within the hallways as well. Din Djarin, however, seemed reluctant - _ever the hero_ , came a bitter thought. The Armourer rid herself of it, and turned to face Din Djarin. 

“Go,” she said, and repeated it to him alone when he didn’t obey - “Go.”

He stopped in front of her, looking as if he still wanted to say something. There was no need. The Armourer had undoubtedly healed enough to protect her own forge already, no matter the count of the enemies. _There are only so many,_ she thought to herself with a little self-serving glare over her shoulder, at the archway, _that can fit in the corridors_.

“Be safe on your journey,” she told Din Djarin, and, as he passed her with a thanks, turned around to watch them leave.

 _I do not wish to hear about your head on a spike, Din Djarin,_ she almost said. _Do not bring it upon me, and upon your foundling._

She stayed silent, and they were on their way. Somewhere, in the corner of her heart, she wanted to join them, but the urge was too insignificant to even be considered, much less compared to the duty she had here.

The Armourer turned around, listening to the boots still somewhere far off in the hallway, nearing quicker and quicker. In no true hurry, she reached out and took the tongs from the table by the wall, and raised her hammer to her chest. As she passed her forge, her hand dropped absentmindedly to rest on the edge. The flames were tame, fleeting, but came alive at her touch. It was all a clever system, naturally, and it gave her strength. It gave her faith, and the reminder that, as long as there was a single person to remember, they’d never truly die out. The fire roared, the heat rising to her fingers, and she drew her hand back before she got burned.

Underneath the helmet, The Armourer’s lips curved the slightest bit upwards. She backed down a couple of steps, crossed the tongs and the hammer over her heart, and knelt down before her forge.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. "Alor" - leader, chief. Back to text
> 
> 2\. "Demagolka" - a war criminal, a monster, someone who commits unforgivable atrocities.Back to text
> 
> 3\. "Ni su'cuyi, gar kyr'adyc, ni partayli, gar darasuum." - Remembrance of deceased loved ones; lit. "I’m still alive, but you are dead. I remember you, so you are eternal." Usually followed by repetition of loved ones’ names.Back to text


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i wanna apologize bc i know absolutely NOTHING abt starwars and it's the biggest fandom i've written for i think, but i think i did a pretty good job in general research? anyway sorry for any completely idiotic mistakes i might've made lol
> 
> i do love how mando'a seems to structure sentences similarly to lithuanian so i can take some liberties assuming it's at least a little like my actual mothertongue haha

She had found most; others found her themselves. It was a slow process, exhausting, finding out how many more had died out there. But they had rebuilt, as she’d promised.

It was not a very densely-populated enclave, but the Armourer couldn’t say she didn’t appreciate what she had. There were more younglings than grown Mandalorians, she admitted that much, but that only meant a brighter future, a future when the halls would be far less empty, filled with chatter she now heard constantly only right outside her forge. It rolled overhead where people were betting, competing, showing off weapons and then trailing off into a pensive silence.

She was just old enough to remember the Night of a Thousand Tears. Despite most of her Tribe having no great wish to be reminded of such an act of genocide, the end of so many lives, Mandalore itself - she could recall vividly the silence and the chill of empty hallways, and the way people would freeze up at the mention, and the following anger. 

The massacre on Nevarro was, she supposed, their own Night of a Thousand Tears. The younglings chirped, blissfully unaware, or, if not, thinking about it only for a moment before continuing their games. Walking through the corridor, she'd see the deep sorrow set in too early. She'd see the children halt for a second, slump, staring blankly into the ground, then shake their heads and go on. She'd see them trying to ignore the empty spots that used to be filled by their now-gone playmates. She didn’t blame them. Neither did the older Mandalorians, who suddenly found their tables empty, the heads of their friends in the crowds gone, and that the Way had killed more than half of the people they knew.

Fights would erupt regularly, though either side was seldom truly imposing - one said something wrong to the other, the other did something unfitting, and there you had it; entertainment of the day for those that jumped in to pull the people away from each other. The skirmishes weren’t based on moral decisions or views, merely impulse, bottled anger and survivor's guilt, so the Armourer didn’t get involved much, either.

She had her own work to deal with. Unusable armour, scathed helmets, shattered signets, lack thereof - weapons. Weapons. Weapons. She had no right to push away the reasons why she had to design and make so many. She had no right to look away from her people's fears, even for a second - but were they really fears, and not expectations based on what had happened to them, to their families and their home?

She let them fight their fights. She didn't meddle in their affairs. She hardly even showed herself these days, unless someone came to her to ask for something. Even advice. The Armourer found herself giving advice; sometimes she herself wouldn't have known how to follow it, but it was her duty. 

_How_ , they'd ask, _how do I go on. I've lost so many_ , they'd say. _There's nothing that rids me of thought. I've lost my children,_ one would tell her, and the helmet would do nothing to hide the lump in his throat. _My wife, my love,_ another would whisper, her tone rising and falling as she trembled just the slightest bit. _I'm all alone,_ said a Foundling whose voice was terrifyingly even, _My Buir is gone and I'm all alone again_. 

_Let those around you be kind to you_ , she said; _And always remember that you are Manda. All of us are; those here today, and those that have departed. They are not gone, merely marching, and one day you will march alongside them._

Not gone, merely marching. If she kept repeating it as frequently as she did now, her tongue was going to dry.

And to those she could offer no comfort, she did not dismiss. All of those she did not know what to say to, she let stay for a moment. She ceased her work and came to them, let them sit and sat herself. Some of them only stilled in their seats, nodding to her and taking a minute to be within themselves before they left. Others held onto her, and she didn’t pull away.

She was a Mandalorian, and the Tribe was her family. So alone she worked, and worked, and worked, and one of these days she was going to drop, but the day hadn't come yet, and she had just awoken from the few hours of sleep she could get. Then it was back to working. Weapons. Weapons.

That was why the Armourer did not react to the commotion outside her forge. She didn’t spare it a single glance, really, hunched over the metal plates that were laid out on her table, choosing the ones for melting. It was just the general ruckus, she figured.

That was until a young woman bolted into her forge without warning, running up the few stairs to stand right behind her.

“Thi,” the Armourer started, but didn’t manage to finish before being interrupted. “What is--”

"It's Din Djarin," Thi's voice was clear, but disturbed by a great sense of urgency. "The one we helped back on- on Nevarro. His… friend, she brought him here. A foundling is with them."

The Armourer turned her head in her direction, and leaned back up from the table. She eyed Thi, who was frozen in wait for her reaction, but, even with the helmet on, visibly frightened. 

"He is wounded?" The Armourer's tone was even, and her expression unseen.

“Yes,” Thi confirmed, and now her breath hitched in her throat. It must’ve been bad, then. In spite of being barely older than a foundling in training, she was not easily fazed. Leveling her voice, she added, “Badly.”

The Armourer stepped down from the forge, hammer fastened by her side in an instant, and stood before Thi.

“Take me to them.”

Nodding obediently, Thi spun on her heel and marched on out, followed closely by the Armourer, who unceremoniously shoved the armour pieces off the table as she was walking past. It fell to the side, landing unharmed with gentle clinking against the hard floor, but nobody heard - the two were already outside in the corridor. It was not of Beskar. She did not hold it in the same level of consideration.

“We forbade her from bringing him further in, closer to the forge.” Thi sounded apologetic, turning her head to look over her shoulder. “We didn’t think it’d be a good idea to.... We had not seen her here before, and she admits she isn't one of us.”

“You made a wise decision,” the Armourer praised her, catching up and continuing by her side. She had an idea of who Din Djarin’s ‘friend’ was, though. And if she was right, then the person had very well seen a Mandalorian’s forge before. "Albeit baseless, perhaps."

Before the remark would require an explanation to clear up Thi’s obvious confusion, the Armourer sped up, having noticed her people crowding around a strange silhouette on the ground. Some Mandalorians were defensive, their weapons ready, though not exactly aimed, and the others, those who recognized one of their Tribe, were reaching out to him.

The helmet helped the Armourer discern from some distance that the silhouette comprised two people - the human woman that was escorting Din Djarin last time she’d seen them - so she _was_ correct - and the latter himself. The human eye mangling them together was justifiable - Din Djarin’s entire body was slumped against the woman. It looked like they’d collapsed once they were stopped by the group of Mandalorians; Din Djarin could obviously hardly stand - she couldn't tell whether he was even conscious - and the Armourer figured his friend had already been dragging him quite some way already. She only held onto one of his arms, though - in the other one, safely tucked into a sandy blanket, was a squirming, cooing form.

"Put him down," one of the closer men commanded, unabashedly pointing his blaster right at her. "How did you get here? How did you find us?"

"Get that thing out of my face," she demanded, her own blaster ready in her hand once she’d put the foundling down. The Armourer remembered the glances of mistrust she'd sent and received last time she saw them, and walked faster. Thi sped up to a jog to keep up with her. "I didn't drag him down here for you lot to shoot us!"

"How did you find the Covert!?" another Mandalorian cut in, stepping closer, shielding a curious youngling behind her. 

The woman whipped her head around to face her, teeth bared. "I've got one of your own men in my arms! How in the hell do you think--"

"Enough."

The appearance of the Armourer had a halting effect - the Mandalorians froze in place, hesitant; in a moment, the younger ones flooded back and the older ones merely turned to stare at her. 

The woman whipped her head up and, maybe subconsciously, cradled Din closer to herself. The foundling, who’d squirmed his way out of his warm little prison of a blanket, cocked its head to the side, as if it was trying to ask her something. Din Djarin's head didn't move. She couldn't see whether he was breathing underneath the armour. 

The Mandalorians parted to let her through, walking with her hand up to silence the few that spoke out, and, with little hesitation, she crouched down to face the pair. A murmur of disbelief rolled over the covered heads at her straightforward, to them - reckless approach.

“Were you seen?” she asked, directing it to Din Djarin, but it was his friend who answered. 

“No,” she said. The Armourer looked up, gradually taking her in. The woman’s clothes were bloodied and her ammunition full - not her blood, then, and not her fight. 

“You are certain,” she pressed, and the woman’s face twisted into an expression of outrage.

“He’ll bleed out on your own damn floor if you don’t do something!”

The Armourer’s hand hovered over Din Djarin’s chest, but she couldn’t take him from her yet. There were many foundlings in their care, now, and not so many of those that could protect them - they were not the same as they used to be, and she had a duty.

“You are _certain_ ,” she repeated, staring right into the woman’s eyes; and although her helmet obscured her gaze well, she could tell it was received. “Carasynthia Dune, are you certain?”

“Yes, I’m certain, goddamn you, I'm certain, help him!” Her eyes darted around frantically, pressing down on Din Djarin’s wounds. It was not going to aid him much. 

But Dune was certain they had not been seen.

The Armourer nodded, turning around. “That is good. Cerin, take Din Djarin to my forge. I made space over the table.” Cerin stepped up hesitantly, quite clearly eyeing Dune, who no doubt sensed it and glared right back as he took Din Djarin from her. The Armourer led him back, grabbing Thi by her arm. “Thi, get some bacta from the back storage. More than you think is required.” Toughing things out was unfortunately one of Thi’s most prominent traits, and she often overestimated others. But Din Djarin was barely breathing, she could feel it now, one hand on his chest - he’d need more than she thought he would.

“The table,” she reminded Cerin, who gave a nod and stepped into the forge. “It’ll be easier this way.”

Then, she stopped Dune, who had unceremoniously scooped up the foundling into her arms and was about to follow him.

“You will have to stay back in the corridors,” she said, gloved fingers splayed in the air to prevent Dune from going forward. “We will let you know of Din Djarin’s state - be it safety or death - truthfully, once we know about it ourselves.”

“Death?” Dune’s eyes lit up at once, and the Armourer had seen enough faces in her time to recognize anger. “Hey, I’m staying with!” 

The Armourer stared her down, but Dune, helmetless as she was, still managed to pinpoint where the Armourer’s eyes were and stared back at her through the visor. 

“You cannot stay here,” the Armourer repeated.

Dune crossed her arms. “Why, why not?”

“You are an outsider, even if you are holding one of our own,” she said, her voice growing sharper in a hurry. “I request that you wait in the hallways. Not inside the very heart of our home.”

“Yeah, and I request you not to be a self-serving snob. That’s my friend over there, you know.” Dune put her free hand on her hip, and the Armourer raised her hand again, to stop the Mandalorians who were already pulling out their blasters at the insult. “‘Or death’, how can you people say it like that? Like it's nothing! Isn’t he one of your own? Isn’t family a big thing with you?”

"It covers too much to be argued about with an outsider," the Armourer said, tone low, a warning. This was neither the place nor the time to be explaining the Creed to somebody not of the Tribe.

Dune opened her mouth, closed it, stepped up to the Armourer, whose helmet compensated for the inch or so Dune had on her. "Yeah, okay, just, he's--" she hesitated only for a moment, staring down through the Armourer's visor with these fiery eyes, "he is, he's like family to me too. And this kid’s his son, isn’t he?"

The Armourer took a breath before cutting her off, firmly this time, but the words made her reconsider. There was truly no time to be getting into any skirmishes as Din Djarin's life was dripping from his body to her table and from there to the floor.

She closed her eyes for a moment, knowing the Enclave would not take this well. But even they knew it was the Way.

“You may stay,” the Armourer allowed. “But come no closer to the forge.”

There was distant chatter among the Mandalorians, but it quieted down in a moment - they accepted her decision, with some obvious reluctance that she understood and agreed with, to a point. Dune clicked her tongue.

“I’ve already _been_ in your--”

The Armourer would not show her any more leniency. It was already risky to let her stay. “It had been different, then.”

Before Dune could ask why, the Armourer whipped around and rushed back into her forge, her footsteps echoing across the corridor. Dune scowled, but stayed, looking over to find the rest of the Mandalorians shooting glances of distrust at her, absentmindedly rocking the distressed baby.

The Armourer marched into her forge and straight to Din Djarin, whom Cerin had carefully laid down on the low table. She nodded to him, stepping closer. The ground would’ve been a poor choice because of the accessibility they’d lose, and she really had nowhere else to put him. Sick or injured Mandalorians were put back into their makeshift beds, sometimes even isolated, but she did not know a room that was both close enough to bring him to and not occupied; besides, Din Djarin had been away for a very, very long time.

“What injured him?” she called out to Dune, who peeked into the forge, leaning over.

“If you just let me in,” she began.

“What injured him?” the Armourer repeated, insistent. Dune sighed, eyeing the unconscious form worriedly.

“We had a bad landing, so he-- went out with the kid, wanted to get something for his ship,” she said, rushing to get the words out, rushing to get them to help him. “Left me on guard. He turns his back for one second, Imperials gang up on the little guy. Figures, news got around after all. He jumps in, because of course he does, turns out they’ve got some flashy firepower, explosions and everything, and this is what happens.” Dune snorted, crossing her arms over her chest. “He dragged himself back to the ship, said he was fine, just needed some time, all the garbage heroics you people try to pull. I thought I’d give him the benefit of the doubt, said okay, whatever, go put some bacta on that, next thing I know, he’s fallen out of the cockpit and face-down in the cargo bay.”

 _Sounds very much like Din Djarin_ , the Armourer refrained from saying. She had more important things to do instead of hearing Dune talk about their misadventures, now.

“And the child?”

It was sitting on Dune’s arm with uncharacteristic silence, looking over to where Din was laid down. The Armourer knelt over him, checking where the most damage had been done and untying his plates of armour with nimble fingers. It would’ve been easier if she didn’t have such thick gloves, but her hands would constantly be burnt otherwise.

“Threw the odd stormtrooper around, he told me.” Dune scratched the top of his head, and the Child blinked at the Armourer as if he expected her to make a miracle happen. No, nothing was happening before Thi with the bacta got here. “After I said the kid could try and heal him. Seemed eager, too. Din refused. Said he’d just woken up, gods know how long he’d sleep after healing him.” She shook her head, glancing away. “I get that he loves his kid, but if he dies now because he’s that big of an idiot--”

“Looking out for his family does not make him an idiot,” the Armourer said, placing Din Djarin’s pauldron onto the table behind her. 

“Neither would looking out for himself a little every once in a while,” Dune muttered. The Armourer voiced neither an explanation of their culture nor her hesitant agreement. If she didn’t know him or herself, she would’ve thought Din Djarin had an impressive wish for death - but then again, the same could have been said about her from an unfamiliar perspective.

The Armourer loosened the plate over his thigh, and a little grunt of pain tumbled out from underneath Din Djarin’s helmet. She glanced up, then down, and, upon closer inspection, his thigh was - well, something had very much broken. Nearly ground into dust. _Walked back to his ship_ , Dune had said.

“They crushed him like this?” she clarified, glancing back to Din Djarin. He didn’t look the part to be taken down by simple laserfire, nor the ‘flashy’ sort Dune mentioned, especially considering his Beskar armour. “That is very strange.”

“Yeah, well, I’m as surprised as you are. Since, y’know, I can’t see anything you do,” Dune said, loudly, after disappearing behind the corner again. “Just help him.”

As they were talking, the Armourer had checked for difficulty breathing and measured the pulse. She was, despite what Dune believed, not too eager to sit around and wait for Din Djarin’s death at all.

“Cerin, find the healer,” the Armourer ordered, and he nodded obediently once more, deliberately or accidentally hooking onto Dune with his shoulder as he passed by. “Then we’ll decide what to do next.”

“I’m here,” Thi called, appearing from the other side with a crate of patches. “I didn’t know how much you were asking for, so I brought all I could find.”

“Thank you,” the Armourer muttered instead of scolding. This was not the time. 

She stood up to take the crate and set it down on the ground next to Din Djarin. Picking up a couple, she tossed aside the removed chestplate with considerably less respect than she typically showed Beskar steel, and pressed one to his side. The other, to the thigh.

“Hold them here,” she told Thi, who pressed her slightly shaking hands to the wounds. “Good. Press harder.” 

“What about internal injuries?” Thi asked. “The patches can hardly heal that.”

The Armourer didn’t reply. She knew very well the patches alone would not suffice. But they didn’t have a tank, and the other option was extremely undesirable to say the least. It’d come down to Din, after all, whether he’d value his life over his honour - and of course he wouldn’t. But they’d have to wake him up to ask. Could they even wake him after this? The bacta would give him some strength, but the internal bleeding would persist until…

Rushed footsteps interrupted her thoughts, and the Healer rounded the corner, paying little attention to the outsiders. 

“Mand’alor,” she said, addressing the Armourer with a bow of the head. Nothing had persuaded her to save the honorifics for the true sole leader of Manda’yaim - she’d always said people needed a leader, as few as the people were, and her forge was the place to look for honour. Eventually the Armourer stopped refusing the title. “What is wrong?”

“One of us is injured,” she told her, nodding toward Din Djarin. “Your skill is needed. Will the bacta we’ve given him serve him enough?”

The old Mandalorian glanced around briefly, then stepped up to Din Djarin, clever fingers checking the sides and underneath the patches, checking how much blood had been lost and her every nerve whispering about how much easier it would be just to put him out of his misery. She did not seem surprised to see one of them in such a state. Then again, little surprised Mandalorian healers.

“How’s it,” Dune called from behind the wall.

The Healer looked up, then down. Turned to the Armourer briefly, and then over to Dune.

“I cannot say,” she told her, and, to the rest of them, announced, “All of this goes beyond the capabilities of the bacta you have supplied him with.”

The Armourer’s fingers twitched on Din Djarin’s helmet as Dune’s head appeared from behind the corner again.

“What?” she barked. “So what, you’re just gonna let him die? Because you haven’t got a tank or something?”

The Armourer stood up straighter and let Din Djarin go. No, she had no comfort to offer. She had no way of telling him to persist; to hold on. She could not tell him which choice would be right for him to make. He was in the dark now.

All she could do was state, in a voice as even as possible, “Nobody will die here today." Then, looking up to the Healer, she added, "Tell me what to do to save him. He can survive this."

“Yes, perhaps so,” she agreed, carefully brushing her fingers against the patch over his side. There was blood oozing out from underneath it, and she tilted her head. “The outsider is correct, if we had a bacta tank, everything would be quite different. But, for now, all I can tell you is if you keep replenishing the bacta, if you get some for the head, and if he ingests some, he has a chance. It will not look pretty, but he has a chance.”

“A chance is all we need.” The Armourer offered the Healer a grateful nod. “I thank you. I wish to wake him."

"I would not recommend it.” The Healer tilted her head, smoothing the patch over the skin. “It will take away much of his strength.”

“It is necessary,” the Armourer countered, stepping up to him. “He cannot swallow bactade while he is unconscious.”

 _We cannot remove his helmet while he is unconscious._ Everyone was aware that this was the true meaning of her words, and the Healer, after a moment’s hesitation, nodded.

“That would be the logical choice, then,” she said, stepping back, allowing the Armourer to take her place, “Mand’alor.”

“Please stay nearby - we might need you once more,” the Armourer asked, looking away from her.

"This is the Way." The Healer moved aside, bowing her head again, and hid in the shadow behind the forge.

“Cerin,” the Armourer addressed him. “Escort Carasynthia Dune away from the forge. And let everyone keep a distance for the time being.”

“I told you I wasn’t leaving.” Dune’s voice was firm. The Armourer did not wish to argue any more. “He’s my friend. I care about him. I don’t know how else to explain it to you people. You should understand.”

Before the Armourer could open her mouth, Cerin spoke.

“We want to help him, outsider,” he said quietly. “He is one of us. We will not harm him. If you place your trust in us regarding him, we will not betray it. Stand aside, and as soon as his life is ensured, I will inform you myself.”

“He is correct,” the Armourer said, without taking her eyes off Din Djarin.

Dune glared as if she'd been in this exact situation before and knew better, but ultimately spun on her heel and followed Cerin further into the hallway. The Child, who had been suspiciously quiet in her arms, whined and whimpered and fussed, trying to squirm out, return to the forge. The Armourer hardly heard the efforts.

Three and a half breaths later, well-after Cerin had returned, Din's eyes opened. They did not see it, naturally, but with his first conscious inhale, he flinched at the sight of the Armourer over him. He flinched, then froze. 

The Armourer opened her mouth to speak, but he was quicker.

“The kid,” he said. Barely managed it, with a strangled voice and a clearly dry throat. “Where’s the kid?”

“He is safe,” she was quick to reassure him, and his entire body visibly sank back onto the surface. “Carasynthia Dune has him, just outside the forge.”

“She’s alright,” he muttered, further relieved. The Armourer raised an eyebrow.

“Very much so. She does not particularly like us. Though if she continues to pretend that she is the only one who cares for you here, I will start to reciprocate the feeling.”

“Forgive me,” he coughed, “for bringing her here. She is an outsider.”

The Armourer raised her hand to silence him. “Save your breath. I doubt Dune will betray us to the Empire, not unless you give her good reason to - which I assume you will not do. She is a loyal companion, by the looks of it, and a friend you should value. We have hidden the Covert better than last time. I was fairly surprised that you managed to give directions in your state.”

“I--” he tried to shake his head, but the muscles wouldn’t obey. “She won’t betray you.”

“Us,” the Armourer corrected easily. “It is good to have you back, Din Djarin, in as many pieces as you come.”

He gave a miserable little chuckle, and she stepped forward, re-securing the bacta patches.

“There was reason,” she said, making sure the ties were tight enough, “why we woke you up now.”

“I figured,” he said. The Armourer drew back to look at Din - perhaps he’d be strong enough to take care of the head himself. But, at a closer look, she realized there was no chance he could do it unassisted. His chest was barely rising, his body was limp, looked almost asleep, and his words were coming out slurred. “What-- is it?”

“You're wounded. We need to have you take a bottle of bactade, and we need to apply a salve. The Healer deems it your only chance of survival.”

“Yeah,” he murmured, “Feels like it, too.”

He made no attempt to shift, to move at all. For a little while, up until the Armourer spoke again, grim silence loomed over the forge.

“This means we would have to remove your helmet.” 

Something changed in the air - a little trickle of electric tension above them, materializing. Din froze. Completely. Tried to lift his arms, and failed. 

“I was not making the choice for you. This is why you are awake,” the Armourer told him.

He had stopped replying, and she stopped speaking. This was not a decision easily made. This was not a decision easy for _her_ to make, what could be said about him? She knew very well he'd rather die than lose Manda, but he had a son, now. Taking off the helmet would ruin him, but his death would deprive his child of the past, just like what the stormtroopers tried to do.

Din Djarin’s helmet glimmered in the warm light of the forge. He was ghostly still, and rather clearly thinking. The only visible movement was that of his throat once he swallowed before speaking.

“I want,” he said, “to talk. To Cara.”

The Armourer pressed her lips together. The outsider was not yet in her forge and she had her qualms, but if a dying Din asked for it - “You may do so.”

“But, Alor, our culture isn't something to talk about with an outsider,” Thi argued, but the Armourer halted her and the Healer, who was about to stand up to invite the woman back in, with the same gesture.

“I don’t want to ask her advice,” Din managed. “I--” He gave a shaky exhale. “I want to ask her to take care of the kid.”

There was a moment of silence until the implications settled in, and then the Armourer closed her eyes as Thi and Cerin erupted into protest. They both knew him as one of their own, and they both had less order to uphold than she did. They were young, and although they also knew the importance of _beskar’gam_ 1, they did not see it as something to die for. 

Something was slowly piecing itself together in her mind. A plan, a theory. 

“This is ridiculous,” Cerin said. “This is hardly what one should die because of.”

“This is my honour,” Din answered, simply. “Do not try and coax me out of it.”

Thi was taking a more direct approach, her fingertips nearly at the edges of the helmet. “Come on, we’re not going to look. You know that doesn’t break the Creed! We’re your Tribe, too--”

“No.”

With all his strength, Din turned away. His fingers hooked onto the blaster that nobody had bothered to take off, and Thi withdrew with some reluctance.

“Ask me again and I won’t warn you.” His voice was quiet. Not a truthful threat, but bordering on it.

“Cease the argument,” the Healer interrupted, waving her hand. “It is his choice, Thi. No threats of slaughter, Din Djarin, even on your deathbed - but you should reconsider.”

The Armourer, who’d been silent for some time, stood up straighter, seemingly growing a couple inches before she stepped in. There were a few options for Din, and he only saw the two of them, in black and white. The Armourer saw in gray tones, and she despised it. They had switched - the blurring of lines was never her doing, and she saw very clearly the two paths in opposite colour - the right way and the wrong way, as Manda commanded. But, this time, perhaps she could afford to make use of conflicting colours.

“Leave,” she said to Thi and Cerin simply, and they up and obeyed her, though casting glances at Din Djarin. She couldn’t tell whether the glances were offended or pensive. The Healer followed without being commanded, brushing her hand over the Armourer's shoulder on her way out.

Din Djarin moved his head just a bit, to look at her.

“No,” he said, except this time it was quiet, almost a plea, as she approached him. “No.”

She did not touch him. She only sat down on the table next to him. He tried to squirm, or move, or anything - his body would immediately recoil into itself, trying to lessen the pain of even the slightest shift.

“I wish to make sure you understand your actions, especially in this state,” the Armourer said, looking straight ahead. Din was silent. “If you refuse the bactade, you will die.”

“And if I don’t, I’ll die as well,” he replied. The Armourer turned her head to look at him. “Ever since they found me, I was a Mandalorian. I won’t lose myself by betraying the Creed.”

Somehow, it seemed like he was drawing strength from his determination. He sounded a little less weary, though his blood had begun seeping through the patch slower and slower. This could either be mildly concerning or very, very bad.

“It is courageous of you to join Manda on your own accord instead of tainting your soul,” the Armourer told him. She meant it. “But there are many aspects of Resol’nare that are just as vital as the donning of the helmet.”

“None that we give such importance to as we do to this,” Din said, and a coughing fit took over him. The Armourer waited. He was right, naturally, but claiming that it was the only part that mattered to him would’ve disappointed her greatly.

“Perhaps honour is our root,” she agreed. “But it is ours to do with as we please.”

“The only thing worse than losing your honour by force is letting someone take it willingly,” Din managed. He could barely move his fingers, what’s to say of the rest of the body. 

Ever-patient, the Armourer leaned forward.

“The others cannot make you _dar’manda_ . A soul cannot be given by another, it cannot be done the way our ancestors attempted, by forcing outsiders to convert. This means that it cannot be taken away by another either. Nobody can do that. I cannot, and the Tribe cannot. Only you can do so, by letting someone look at you without your helm, when they are not of your clan, of your family, and by realizing you are losing yourself. You would be breaking the Creed. An honourable death is preferred.” She still felt the cold fingers on her chin. She still felt the strike she delivered onto the one that tried to strip her of her dignity, the impact that spiked all the way up through her arm and into her shoulder. “But, by choosing life now, you are _following_ Resol’nare; you are an exception for one reason. You care for a Foundling. You have to look after it. It is above all else.”

 _Younglings,_ a memory rang in her head, _and all those that care for a youngling. I speak unto you - you will not join the fight. I hear your fury and I share your pain, but we cannot risk the future of Manda'yaim. Take the younglings, then, and escape - your legacy will not be called cowardice; it will be called preservation._

_All of you who care for a youngling; hear me. It is said so in the Resol'nare. This is your highest duty. This is the Way._

The talk of his foundling awakened something inside Din - his voice was suddenly a little less muffled, a little clearer. But the uncertainty was still alive and well, and for good reason. The Foundlings usually looked at things very literally, to the point where they were willing to die instead of removing their helmet when the removal would not break any single one of the tenets.

“I would rather die and join Manda than become dar’manda,” he said. 2

“As would I. I can tell you that if you follow on your current path, you will join Manda without question,” the Armourer assured him. “But it is not today. ”

“If you take off my helmet,” he said, suddenly sounding very very tired - “it will be never.”

The time was running out.

“You are forgetting that I am Mandalorian. I will not disgrace you.” 

She knew the Resol'nare inside and out, in all its forms and all its interpretations - theirs must've been the strictest of them all. But she knew the duty of parenthood to be higher than the duty of armour - simply because if there were no parents that survived to teach the importance of the tenets, there would be no Mandalorians at all.

He turned his head, barely. “...How?”

The Armourer shifted forward, sinking down so their eyes were aligned. 

“I want you to know that I will not lay my eyes on you, Din Djarin.” He drew in a breath. She sounded even more sure than she was - a honed skill of a leader. “Not for a single moment will I look at you.”

"Swear to me," he said, and his voice broke; she couldn’t tell whether it was because of the pain he was in or the difficulty of the decision he was making. He’d fight tooth and nail, but she had never once heard him plead before. “Swear to me that you will never dishonour me.”

The Armourer looked up, reached out. Her thickly-gloved fingers brushed softly against Din’s shoulder. 

“Draar, Din Djarin,” 3 she muttered, and sank down lower to reach his helmet. _I shall not._

Hunched over beside him, the Armourer discovered a curious thing - removing a helmet off a corpse did not feel the same as taking it off a living, albeit unmoving, Mandalorian. There was something different in the knowledge that Din was probably looking at her, anticipating the air flooding in, the warmth of the room, and, as was only natural, worrying that she’d break her vow. Natural, perhaps - but baseless. 

Her fingers were splayed against the Beskar - even and smooth, her own craft. Then, she stilled for the slightest moment, the cool surface of the steel melting through her gloves.

“This is the Way,” the Armourer said, watching him carefully. _Trust me_.

Din released the breath he’d been holding. “This is,” he said, quietly, “the Way.”

A pause. A consideration. A shift.

"Hold still."

She felt it push his hair out of place. She heard it scrape against his forehead. She sensed how much lighter it became without the weight in it. Din’s uncovered head fell back. She placed the helmet behind her, next to the pauldron with the skull of the Mudhorn.

The air must've been chilly. The colours must've become vivid.

As promised, she did not look up at him. If she had, she would've seen that this eyes were tightly shut as to not look up at her, either.

The Armourer reached to the side, fished the bactade out from the crate and unscrewed the lid. She had tasted it before, and it was not a pleasant experience - but knowing that under its influence one's internal wounds would stitch themselves together usually helped it. 

She swirled it, watching the muddy gray liquid whirl in the container lazily. The consistency somewhat resembled gelatin and had a putrid smell. Unfortunate, but necessary.

She hung her head down, and closed her eyes. Reached up and pressed the bactade against Din’s chest, straight up.

“Tell me,” she said, holding it just above him.

“Forward,” Din said. She moved her hand. “Forward.” She moved her hand. “Higher.” She lifted her hand. “Too high.” She dropped her hand slightly.

It was a mechanic, slower game of cu'bikad, almost. Only she didn't see her target. The Armourer didn't remember much of it, other than that her aim got better very quickly. She hoped it hadn't been dulled by lack of use.

“Good,” Din said in a little while, a little hesitantly, and the Armourer didn’t blame him. 

"You will keep it down?" she asked. Din gave an uncertain little sigh.

"I can't tell."

"Try."

She tilted the bottle, and he drank - then, he choked. Knowing the chalky taste and the repulsive consistency, she moved it back and waited for him to quiet down before making him drink again. Frequent breaks repeated as Din really could hardly keep it down, but she persisted until the bactade was finished.

Silence settled as the Armourer slowly moved the empty bottle back, and put it on the ground, where she had nestled. She didn’t look up. 

“Are you,” Din Djarin said, “are you… going to sit there?”

His voice was different without the helmet, she was sure everyone’s would be. 

“Until I hand you the helmet and you can put it on yourself - I am,” she answered him calmly, then listened to him drawing a breath in through his teeth. “You need not force it. I will know.”

“What about--” he coughed, “--what about the Child? And Cara?”

“They are in the corridor, along with Thi. I sent them away. The forge had to be empty." She turned her back to the table and sat up straight, unmoving. She fixed her eyes on the tongs on the wall, examining the dents and the handle, the shining dulled by her constant use. "The outsider told me your injuries were sustained protecting the Foundling."

"I-- I turned around for one minute, and… There he was." Din's voice was louder. Just a little less muffled. Speed was the bactade's core property, possibly the most important one. "Swarmed by them, the Imperials. And I knew he could defend himself if he wanted but, I, just--"

"You could not stand and watch," the Armourer concluded for him, a little monotonously.

_The corridors, flooded by stormtroopers. The adults and the younglings alike, dead, run into the ground. She was suffocating in the stench of blood and flame, the one sensation that had never bothered her before._

"Of course not."

Feeling as if she’d just woken up from a dream, the Armourer shook her head. "Then you made the right choice."

A moment of consideration, and a sincere "Thank you."

She responded only with a nod he couldn't see and an offer of companionable silence.

Soon enough, though, Din spoke again. Wounded Din Djarin was rather talkative, the Armourer thought. Then again, most of them were; it was a strange phenomenon. She simply didn’t have anyone there to talk to when she was last injured.

“Has the Child awoken?” he asked, and there was a fair share of concern in his voice. The Armourer’s fingers twitched, gripping the side of the table.

“You cannot remember?”

“I can’t remember much after I made my way to the ship,” he confessed, and the Armourer felt her lips involuntarily tug upward. _You cannot remember guiding an outsider into the Covert, through the outposts and the many maze-like tunnels_ . _Convenient_.

“The Child was already awake when Carasynthia Dune brought you here,” she told him, and heard him breathe out in relief. “He is well.”

“Thank you,” he said, again. The Armourer looked to the side without reply.

“What about the rest of your many associates, are they on the planet?” It was her turn to question him. 

“Hm?”

“Greef Karga, say.” 

Din stuttered, then made some expression, presumably - the Armourer had not looked up - and said, “No, he’s off-world. He doesn’t fly with me - not that I particularly want him to. He’s the Guild leader. A grounded man, I suppose.” He wasn't too surprised with the fact that she knew his name.

“I know of your Guild. What became of the droid?” she asked him.

“Self-destructed,” he replied.

She frowned, a little confused as to how that worked. “You have my condolences.”

“It was just a droid.”

The Armourer nodded again and didn’t question him further. She knew of his distaste for the machines, and didn’t fault him for it. She was old enough to remember her own friends talking over the silence that was usually filled by others, talking about steel ships and steel cannons, and steel flashing and falling and bodies around them. How many of those that used to be children were alive now? There was no way to tell. But she was old enough to understand. Old enough to know of the terrible siege that befell Manda’yaim, to have felt it first-hand. To have had someone - many - die in her arms. Few hadn't.

"Does Carasynthia Dune fly with you?" she asked. 

"Not always," he answered, caught a little off guard by the tone of his voice. "She has business on Nevarro, courtesy of Karga. I called her on as a favour, though. I needed a shocktrooper." The pause was minimal. "And a friend."

The Armourer stayed still. "She is very capable."

"To say the least," Din agreed. The table creaked as, slowly, he brought himself up by his elbows, then all the way up until he was sitting. He would not stay down for long, especially placed like a piece of broken armour on her table.

He gave a breath, and she heard him shift - she closed her eyes, in advance. Baseless. Din Djarin leaned over her and spoke, “I can put it on now, I think.”

She opened her eyes, finding the lid to the bactade on the ground and screwing it on. “You think, Din Djarin?”

Another chuckle.

“I’m sure.”

“Good.”

She shifted closer to the table and reached out to lift his helmet. Taking in the combination of the lifeless visor and well-kept edges, she accepted that she would never be used to a helmet a Mandalorian had claimed before off their head, but this was a different matter altogether. Din was alive. She preferred it that way.

"I will turn to you," the Armourer said. "My eyes are closed."

"Alright," he agreed, still a little uncertain. She didn't blame him. 

She did just that, eyes shut and head down for good measure. Her hands stilled, holding the helmet out for him to take - he accepted it with haste, albeit cautiously - she only felt it being lifted, slipping out of her hands, and she lowered them down. Then, she waited.

The hiss and click of a helmet being secured made her lips twitch slightly upward. It wasn't a minor expression of trust, what Din had just done - he had no way of telling whether her eyes truly were closed. 

Though he had no reason to believe they weren't. If she was the type of Mandalorian always looking to discredit others, she would be neither the armourer of a tribe, nor the Alor. If she truly had Seen him, Din wouldn't need to strike her down - she would do it herself.

"It's on," Din said, and the static drowned out the slightest quiver of his voice. 

"I will open my eyes."

"It's on," he confirmed again, and the Armourer looked.

It was, indeed, on, and Din was sitting. There was something in the way he was sitting - a sliver of shame. She had no doubt he disliked being shoved into such a vulnerable state, but some unpleasantries in a Mandalorian's life were far worse than this. Even the impact of one's death faded, if they truly walked the Way of Mandalore.

The Armourer stood up, and stepped closer, resting her arms on the table, inches away from him. Din scrambled up - but, his still-healing external wounds unaccounted for, choked a gasp and hunched over. The Armourer grabbed his arms and sat him back down before he could break something else.

"Do not get up yet," she warned him. "Your injuries are many, and not only the internal ones are severe. Let the bacta take its course. You will not rush anywhere."

"You could've told me," he muttered, barely staying upright. The Armourer tilted her head, and he turned away. "I couldn't feel it."

"I would have," she said, "had you told me you intended on going for a run at once."

She turned around and sat next to him, though facing the other way - the low table creaked again, and Din had been looking for words.

"I wasn't--" he countered. Lamely. "I didn't-- I wasn’t planning on any… runs."

She huffed, and it was probably then that he realized she wasn't serious for once. Stifled a chuckle.

"Thank you," he said. "For my life. Again."

"Manda'yaim will be full of Mando'ade once more on the day I will accept gratitude for caring for my Tribe," the Armourer told him quietly. It was true. The outsider, the displeasure of the rest, those were merely additional troubles, and they were not - Dune specifically - entirely unpleasant, but her main concern had indeed been the preservation of Din's life.

He sought solace in her - as did the rest of them. The Armourer had not once let them down, and she would not begin now. It had not been the first time she looked into the reflective visor of her tribespeople and saw the peering, bloodshot eyes of the Mythosaur. And it had always been a reminder of her own mistakes, of her own imperfections, a fatal flaw she did not yet recognize, like the bloodlust of her ancestors, the greed and arrogance that drove the mythosaurs extinct. The skull of which she forged above her home, the sigil which was etched into her skin underneath the armour - this was all to make it impossible to forget duty. Her duty was one, and it was their survival. 

"That day may yet come," Din said quietly. A strange, warm sensation spread through her chest when she realized he was trying to comfort her, having mistaken her dismissal of thanks as laments about the past.

"And our lives being preserved is the first step to such a time," she told him, and stood up. "Tell me, then, Din Djarin, if you understand this, why do I keep having to stitch you together?"

"I-- You do realize..." It took him one look at her to realize she wasn't accusing him of anything, and he sighed. "You do realize I didn't _want_ to fight any of the bucketheads that day, particularly. And especially not with the kid."

"That is clear." The Armourer left him sitting and stepped to her high table. "I have other concerns. Can you stand now, Din Djarin?" 

In response there was the shuffling of feet behind her, and, promptly, Beskar cried out against the ground when he stumbled.

She allowed herself a little sigh, digging into the steel she'd pulled out. Din had returned, and had apparently been putting himself in more direct danger than them again. This would be a good investment.

"There is no shame in asking for assistance." 

"Yes, I don't doubt you could me up." The grumbling slowly rose higher as he got up, probably holding onto her table in the process. The bacta was fast, it was Din's urge to pretend he was perfectly fine that was slowing the process down. "I'd still rather handle it myself."

"As you wish." Carefully, she laid the metal down to melt. As it dripped down into the forms, she turned to remind Din, "You have lain on my table. I would rather hold you up."

In his haste, Din let go of the tabletop - she found it just a little amusing. He seemed to surprise even himself by keeping himself upright.

"Bacta," he said, impressed, and held up a hand to look at it. "I don't know why so many take it for granted."

"It is a principle of life," the Armourer hummed, taking the filled forms out of the forge. "You will not be missed until you have gone."

Din said nothing, instead looking up to stare at her. She could sense gears turning in his head, soundless - but in deep thought. 

"When can I see the kid?"

The Armourer bowed her head. "I will bring him to you. Soon."

"Let it be sooner," he asked. She glanced over her shoulder, an unseen eyebrow quirked.

"You have grown impatient away from the Covert, Din Djarin," she scolded, not very harsh.

"I worry. That's all." Din averted his gaze to instead to examine the ground. "Is he-- truly alright?

"I do not lie." She radiated certainty, calming assuredness. Sometimes she could feel it coming from her in stronger ways than she felt it on the inside. “He is unharmed.”

“That’s good,” he muttered, more to himself than to her. “Good that he-- didn’t hurt himself trying to help me.”

The Armourer was silent for a minute, gathering the little bullet-like casings and combing through it to find unusable ones with skilled fingers. She didn’t think Din needed a reply.

“You have no more Whistling Birds,” she stated instead, putting the rest down and picking the cracked and shattered out to carefully lay them into the smelter again. “I have forged you the shells, but they must be fed their fire.”

Din shifted behind her. “How long will it take?”

“As long as it always does,” the Armourer responded. “They will be ready for you overmorrow." Hearing nothing but silence, she added, halting momentarily, “Unless you refuse them.”

“I don’t,” Din answered, and there was some semblance of a smile in his voice. “It would be nice to spend some time in the Covert again, for as long as I’m not needed for other matters.”

“Whether you are needed or unneeded does not make a difference to us,” the Armourer told him, turning around, arms crossed as the metal behind her spat steam into the air. “You are not our only provider, not anymore. And if your mind yearns for home, honour the call. You are wanted, Din Djarin, as part of the Covert. This, nobody can take away from you.”

There was a moment of thought hanging between them as the forge quieted down and Din’s eyes quite obviously darted around the room. “Thank you,” he echoed once more. “I’m glad to be home.”

After a fair bit of companionable silence, all the shells were ready. The Armourer stepped back and spun on her heel. Din had more or less stayed in the same pose, other than circling the table to watch her work. His hand rested absentmindedly on his side, and she tilted her head.

“Stay here,” she told him. “I shall bring you the Child if you wish to see him so. Change your bacta patch for a clean one - but a smaller one as well, preferably.”

“Cara will chew you out,” he warned, leaning against the table and obediently reaching for the patch. “She’ll think I’m hurt worse than I am.”

“I cannot remedy that with anything but the truth.” The Armourer returned her hammer into the bounds of her belt and circled him. “She will see you in a few hours - I ask only that you watch over the flame for a while."

When she turned to go, the heat pricked a path after her, reaching for her, pulling her backward. She could feel the eyes on her back, of Din Djarin, uncertain and just the slightest bit exasperated; and of the Mythosaur, passive. Always passive and never disapproving - she had never given it reason to be. But, somehow, each time she had to leave the forge behind for one reason or another, even if she had trusted it to a replacement in her wake, a twinge of guilt would strike her, something that awakened longing within, a primal sense of deep wrongness that demanded she not abandon her home.

But she was walking a couple of steps into the corridor. This was was a rather ridiculous concern, she thought to herself as she rounded the corner.

Carasythia Dune was now surrounded by Mandalorians - mostly the younglings, with a few adults scattered about, keeping their distance. This bunch was far from hostile, rather fascinated - by the tattoo, the clothing, the way she held herself. The little ones were so wrapped up in the strange outsider, her stance and her weaponry, that it took a couple of moments for them to see the Armourer.

"The belt with the ammunition, do you need a new one each time you run out?" questioned a foundling, hand reached out gingerly, just short of Dune's waist.

"Has the recoil ever knocked you back?" added his sister with a matching helmet.

The littlest youngling, helmetless, dove under her friends arm with her eyes sparkling, asking, "Do you use only the gun?" 

Judging by her facial expression, Dune seemed to be having, just, the worst day. Though that had never been a deterrent to children.

"I, uh," she started, a little lost. "I restock my ammunition. The recoil force goes into the ground and doesn't-- I've trained, so it doesn't push me back as much, and I don't only use the gun."

"Do you want to fight?" One of the foundlings offered. Dune opened her mouth, then closed it, looking like she'd just been splashed with icy water.

"Fight… you?" she clarified.

"Yep," she confirmed, bouncing. "I wanna see if I can hold my own against a human! I mean," she clarified, tilting her head, "you _are_ human, right? Where are you from?"

"I--"

"You are welcome to spar with any of your fellow Mandalorians," the Armourer said from behind her, "but leave the outsider be."

She heard the elders chuckle as the children jumped collectively, having been too caught up in their curiosity to see her coming.

"Alor!" the foundling exclaimed cheerfully, stepping up to her. The tone fell when she heard her words. "But why? She's a fighter!"

"I didn't--" Dune tried, unfortunately trailing off. "Listen..."

The Armourer didn't answer, and the girl, though clearly deflated, obeyed. "Yes, Alor," she said. "Will you spar with me, then?"

"In due time," the Armourer promised, and turned to look at Dune. "Go, now."

They scuttled away, some grabbing onto the adults, a few of whom looked up at her in a silent question. She nodded, and they led the children away.

As soon as she turned back, Dune was already up and within inches of her.

"Where is he?" she demanded, no previous subtle spark in her eye.

"In the forge."

"Is he…" she hesitated, then glanced up at the Armourer, question clear.

"He lives."

It had been a long time since she'd seen someone's face be so full of relief when they looked at her. Maybe that was because it’d been a long time she’d seen someone’s face, period. Dune closed her eyes for a moment, opened them and nodded to her.

"Let me guess, I still can't go in." The Armourer shook her head. "Can you -- Can he at least come out here? If not for me, then for the kid."

"Soon," the Armourer promised, and opened her arms. It took Dune a second to realize she was asking to be handed the Child. She hesitated for a moment, but ultimately obliged.

The Armourer, skillfully avoiding the curious little hands that clearly intended to rip a few chunks of fur off her cloak, promptly put him down. He stared at her for a moment.

"Go," she urged him, nodding toward her forge. " _Gar buir olar_."4

The Child cooed - he didn't understand, she knew as much, but the nod of her head was direction enough - as fast as his little legs could carry him, he scampered towards the forge.

"Hey," Dune said, a note of concern rising in her voice. 

"You do not 'do the baby thing'," the Armourer reminded her. The Child disappeared behind the corner, and Dune looked up again, visibly disgruntled. "He will do well here, Carasynthia Dune. He is no outsider."

Maybe a little miffed because of being called what she was, she tilted her head, stepping up to the Armourer.

“How did you know my name earlier?” 

Footsteps crowded the two as the few Mandalorians, having gotten the children away, came to watch the conversation again. The Armorer's pointed glare, implied by the tilt of her head, successfully held them at a distance.

“I know most everyone who enters my forge.”

“Your forge didn’t tell you my name, and I want to know how you found it out.” She crossed her arms over her chest, eyes squinted. “Unless your forge can talk, which wouldn’t be the oddest thing I’ve seen since flying with Din.”

The Armourer raised her hand up, not to Dune, but to the Mandalorians who stood around, now curious, ready to defend, if anything. 

Calmly, she stated, “My forge cannot talk.”

Dune snorted. “Shame. Was hoping it could tell me how you knew my name.”

“It was not hard,” the Armourer told her. “After you left, the few remaining stormtroopers gathered to pick off anyone that had survived. Pick up any of them that had survived, in vain, naturally. I thinned out their ranks a little more, then.” The following massacres that _she_ was on the winning side of this time didn’t so much as make her voice any less even. “I wanted to ask them some questions.”

“Like my name?” Dune questioned. In any other situation, she would’ve been intimidating.

This time the Armourer’s raised hand was for her, though. “I was interested in who they were looking for, for what purpose, and what they intended to do after the purpose was achieved.”

“Well, did you find out?” Dune asked, and the Armourer took note of the rise of her hand. Not quite on her blaster, but the intent was there. Granted, it was probably instinct, subconscious, some sort of sense of safety, but a rather ridiculous one at that. The Mandalorians were still watching, some taking a defensive stance again.

Besides, Dune had yet to betray the Mandalorians. And the Armourer considered herself a fair one; as long as she placed her trust in Dune, Dune could reciprocate with no fear.

“I claimed I had some information, not all of it,” the Armourer said, radiating stubborn serenity. “They were dead before they got to the second question.”

And that was the only truth. Her patience had always fallen just short of unending, but she had a surprising lack of it when it came to babbling, broken men on the ground. She had hardly dealt with such nonsense before. It was enough to make her snap at them - sometimes, she’d urge them to speak too hard. She’d interrogate too harshly, and then there’d be another corpse for her to dispose of.

After a beat of silence, Dune flashed a somewhat impressed grin and dropped her hand, also subconsciously. “Alright,” she said. “I can respect that.”

“Good.”

"And, for-- for him, thank you." She fidgeted, clearly a little unused to her situation. "For caring for him."

Would they stop thanking her for doing her duty today?

"There is nothing you need to thank us for." The Armourer turned, picking her hammer up from her belt. "He is our own."

Dune was about to say something else when the Armourer changed her mind, sliding her hammer back down and spinning on her heel to face her again.

"If anything, we should express our gratitude instead." Dune stared at the gloved hand she was offered with equal parts incredulity and suspicion. “For bringing him here, Carasynthia Dune, _vor entye_ 5 \- I am indebted."

Accepting that there was most likely no hidden threat behind the gesture, Dune took her hand. The Armourer wrapped her fingers around her wrist, brushed her thumb over the inside where her veins lay, and dropped her hand. By the lack of surprise on her face, the Armourer came to the conclusion that Din had probably greeted her the same way before. To the extent of her knowledge, it was distinctly a sign of a Mandalorian, and it seemed that Dune had that figured out.

It was good, that Din Djarin flew with her. Even if it was only on occasion. 

The Mandalorians dispersed around them, content with the conclusion. She heard a few weapons sliding into place - they had been ready. Needlessly. But ready. The massacre on Nevarro had made them paranoid, and rightfully so.

Dune bit down on her lip, glancing over the Armourer’s shoulder at the forge.

Suspecting already what she was going to ask, the Armourer was faster than her. "Din Djarin needs rest."

Dune raised an eyebrow. "Didn't you give him bacta?"

The Armourer hesitated, and once again had to remind herself that Dune was not an enemy and she was not giving out tribal secrets. "We do not have enough."

That took her aback a little. "Oh."

"Do you wish to stay with him?" 

"You're still asking?"

The Armourer nodded to herself pensively. Yes, perhaps she needn't question her. Her next decision was easy to make - but the Covert would not be quite so lenient for so long.

"I will provide you with lodging," she said dryly. "You will have a bed and a meal. You will not wander around the Covert, however, nor will you leave the room after a designated time when most of us are asleep."

Dune’s eyes widened in surprise at first at the offer. Then she was nodding along, clearly considering her options. "Fair," she concluded. "I've got no way to ditch my ride anyway." An admittedly charming smile appeared on her face as she looked on to the Armourer. "Or my friend."

"That is kind," the Armourer told her.

“Oh, I know,” she chuckled. “Uncharacteristic of me. The bastard makes you wanna be kind. He’s that type.”

The Armourer bowed her head, holding back on a small smile that Dune would not have seen either way. 

“I will get somebody to lead you to a vacant room,” she said, and spun on her heel, away from Dune. 

She finally took her hammer into her hands again, and, in thought, her fingers traced a dent in the handle. Behind her, Dune had gotten a little closer than she was before. The Armourer glanced over her shoulder; Dune seemed like she wanted to say something. The Armourer stopped in her tracks.

"Yes?"

Dune cleared her throat, and, quietly: "My name's Cara."

The Armourer turned around. "I am aware."

"No, I know you are-- I never asked Din, but is the whole full name thing important to you?" She made a wide gesture, trying to clear up the question. "Do you always address people in full, I mean. Is it a custom or something?"

"It is not." Dune was taller than her. Even with her helmet. She just noticed. "Only for clarity's sake." _And out of habit_ , she failed to add. 

"Ah. Right. Well, would you mind shortening me down to a first name, at least?" Dune shrugged, glancing down at the ground. "If I meet someone who Carasynthia-Dunes me constantly, I'm right on the lookout for a blaster against my back."

The Armourer figured her own habit was easier - and safer - to step over. "I will adjust if you wish it," she said, and, mildly, added, "Carasynthia."

She nodded as thanks right before they reached the fork in the corridor and the room between the two branches, filled with tables and chairs and Mandalorians. The Armourer surveyed the room. She couldn’t ask Thi to do this while she couldn’t watch her - the girl had an unfortunate distaste for everyone who didn’t wear a helmet. And she was not going to bother the Healer or ask a youngling. Thi’s brother, though, was a different matter.

“Cerin,” she called, and the room stood to attention, eyeing them in anticipation. Carasynthia shifted uncomfortably next to her as Cerin rose, looking over. “Come.”

As soon as they were out of earshot again, the chatter resumed, and the Armourer stopped beside Carasynthia to address Cerin.

“Take Carasynthia Du--…” She stopped herself just before she uttered the name in full again, “...Take Carasynthia to one of the rooms in the unused quarters. We will house her for the time being, until Din Djarin is well enough to leave again.”

Completely unfazed by the news of an outsider staying in the Covert, Cerin asked, “Do I lock her in?”

Carasynthia’s open mouth and an offended expression was answer enough, the Armourer just answered sooner than her. “Not yet, no. She knows better than to cause trouble,” she glared subtly at Carasynthia, “correct?”

“Cross my heart,” she swore with a grin. As Cerin stepped forward, the smile disappeared as quickly as it appeared. “You’d better let me see him soon.”

“I will,” the Armourer said, and waved Cerin off.

The two rounded a corner, and the Armourer allowed herself a sigh before turning around and marching back into her forge, the warmth finally welcoming her back into its arms again. Her eyes involuntarily rose to the Mythosaur skull mounted above the forge before wandering down to find Din Djarin.

Well, that is, him and his foundling. The little one had curled up right against his neck, cooing and whining as Din shushed him as quietly and as softly as he could. The Armourer once again refrained from giving a little unseen smile, out of sheer principle. She merely rounded him and stood in front of her forge; she had other duties. Din Djarin was holding up well, just as she’d suspected.

“You have changed the bacta patch,” she asked.

“Yeah,” Din Djarin answered. “Into a smaller one, just like you asked.” Yes, his side was no longer bleeding, and his eyes had cleared up - mostly as the Armourer suspected.

The Child seemed to have grown tired of holding onto Din’s neck and thus clawed at the helmet on his head. The message was clear, _Take it off. Let me._

“Not now,” Din Djarin chuckled, swatting the Child’s arms away gently. The Child pouted. “Persistent little womp rat.”

The Armourer looked up from her work. It was in the way he phrased it. Definitely in the way he phrased it.

“I take it he has seen you without your helmet?”

He whipped his head back to her, and she didn’t need to see the panic. She heard it.

“No, it’s not that he, he--”

She held up her hand, and Din quieted down, awaiting her reaction.

“I am not accusing,” she said calmly. “He is family.”

Slowly, Din looked down to the Child. Immense relief flooded him - his shoulders relaxed, his hands were gentler on the little Child’s sides. The Child looked up at his father, squealing in obvious joy at such attention.

“Your adiik,” the Armourer said, her voice a little muffled. “Correct?”6

Din didn’t take his eyes off the Child, merely brushing his fingers over his long ear.

“Yeah,” he agreed quietly. Then, to the child, “Ad’ika.”7

The Child responded to the address, tilting his head playfully. Din had apparently called the Child that before, since he recognized the word so easily, and the Armourer knew she’d been right as naming Din as the Child’s father.

"Be cautious," she warned him. "Or he will start thinking it to be his name. Especially if it is the only bit of Mando'a he hears."

"It isn't," Din countered, a little too defensive to be genuine. She understood, he was alone most of the time, and there were few to converse in Mando'a with. She understood, but it was not an excuse. "It… It isn't. He doesn't speak yet."

"I see that," the Armourer replied. The Child cocked his head to the side, watching her curiously as she approached him. "And I see that you may be out of practice. It is part of Resol'nare. It…"

The Armourer stopped and thought for a moment. The Child blinked, reached out. She stepped forth. Then crouched down so her visor aligned with the Child's eyes. Din shifted to give her space, a little confused.

It took her a bit - if she was reciting Resol’nare to herself at a point, it would be in its fullest form. The rhyme had a melody. Not a noticeable one, no, but something that soaked the tongue in sweetness, despite its great importance.

" _Ba'jur bal beskar'gam_ ," the Armourer hummed quietly, to no one but the Child. Then looked up to Din. " _Ara'nov, aliit_."

Recognition dawned on him, and he slid down closer to look at his child, who was listening intently to the unfamiliar tongue. Mando'a was more pronounced than Basic, and, naturally, the Armourer's mother tongue had always sounded far more beautiful to her.

" _Mando'a bal Mand'alor—_ "

" _An vencuyan mhi_ ," Din finished for her. She looked up at him, even though he could not see her face. He had not forgotten. 8

The Child cooed and reached out, and clawed at the edge of the Armourer's helmet, at the spot where the cheek protruded over the recess.

" _Su'cuy, adiik_ ," 9 she greeted, making no attempt to get away from the curious little hands. The foundling seemed interested - whether in the language or the armour, it was good. Either was good.

"I doubt he knows what it means," Din said. His voice was strangely hoarse.

"I doubt you did when you first heard it as well," she countered. "He will learn, and I trust you will help him."

"Of course."

"Speak Mando'a around him when you can do so," she advised him. "It will do good - for the both of you."

Din nodded, gently running his finger over the Child's ear. The Child chirped and clambered up to his lap. Instead of rising to her feet, she checked on his thigh. It was healing well - it was an external wound, after all, and the bacta fixed him up.

“Your armour is holding up well,” she stated, examining him further. He bowed his head.

“Yes. I don’t need any repairs.” Absentmindedly, he traced his chestplate with his free hand. “I have no Beskar to bring right now, but once I do-- I'll bring it for the foundlings. Some of it, at least.”

“Naturally.” She nodded. A small smile had coloured her voice, but Din seemed too preoccupied to hear it. “The foundlings are…” she trailed off, letting silence settle with only a little unheard sigh. _The future._

The Armourer stood up and turned away to return to her table. She was willing to overlook the fact that Din was mindlessly muttering something to himself, no longer concerned with her; the future was in his arms, after all. And, currently, the future was reaching up with its little green hands to grab at his helmet, his cape, just out of reach, and snuggling closer.

The warmth in her chest spread all the way over to her fingertips, slowly. She knew it now, better than before - her Tribe would live on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. "Beskar'gam" - Mandalorian armour. Back to text
> 
> 2\. "Dar'manda" - soulless; to a Mandalorian, a state objectively worse than death. Back to text
> 
> 3\. "Draar" - assuredly never. Back to text
> 
> 4\. "Gar buir olar" - "Your parent (father) is here." Back to text
> 
> 5\. "Vor entye" - an expression of gratitude, literally translated to "I accept a debt". Back to text
> 
> 6\. "Adiik" - small child, typically 3-13 years old. Back to text
> 
> 7\. "Adi'ka" - little one, my child. Back to text
> 
> 8\. The Resol'nare Rhyme - a rhyme taught to Mandalorian children to help them remember the six tenets of the Mandalorian culture. Translation:  
> "Education and armour,  
> Self-defense, our tribe,  
> Our language and our leader—  
> All help us survive."  
> Back to text
> 
> 9\. "Su'cuy" - shortened "Su cuy'gar"; informal greeting; "Hi". Back to text
> 
> with this bad boy finished, it's time for me to restore my wips to factory settings, so i'm off to my little armourer/cara dune corner. unfortunate how few fics there are.
> 
> thank you for reading this one!! i appreciate the feedback i already got on the first half, thank you very much for taking the time to tell me what you think ;w;


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